


June in Kansas

by AconitumNapellus



Category: Route 66
Genre: M/M, Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-26
Updated: 2012-12-26
Packaged: 2017-11-22 12:58:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,875
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/610084
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AconitumNapellus/pseuds/AconitumNapellus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tod and Buz suffer a blow out while driving through the deserted prairie, and have to spend the night under the stars.</p>
            </blockquote>





	June in Kansas

 

June in Kansas was a fine time to be beating down a straight road with the top down and the radio on. Even at speed the sun was hot. Buz sat in the passenger seat with his head back and his hat tilted over his eyes. Tod couldn’t tell if he were asleep or just idling, but it really didn’t matter. He had that encompassing feeling of being alone while everyone else in the world was sleeping. When he glanced at Buz he looked like a child, his lips slightly parted, one arm slack on his lap and the other draped over the side of the car, the wind turning the hairs there into a blur.

The radio was playing Elvis, and he turned it up a notch. Buz must be asleep. He would never stand for something like that when the thing could be retuned to jazz and he could wax lyrical about the greats of the genre and spout terminology as if he had studied the subject at Yale. He reminded Tod sometimes of the arts crowd at his old alma mater – a crowd he had never mixed with and always held in a little disdain. Until he had fallen in with Buz he hadn’t realised how straight-lined and dry his mental life had been. Percentages and ratios and growth potential and capital. Sure the math had always felt beautiful to him, but it was a very crisp kind of beauty.

Somewhere in Buz was a poet, he thought. He tried to persuade him to write some of his thoughts down, to follow Kerouac and Ginsberg, to be a beat poet or a novelist and make something out of the way his thoughts twisted in his head. Buz laughed at him and said, ‘Maybe one day I’ll write my memoirs. But for now – I just want to _dig_ the now. I don’t want to pin it down on paper. I just want to ride along with it and live it.’

‘Fair enough,’ Tod shrugged, but he made up his mind to note down some of Buz’s speeches and dreams, always when he wasn’t looking, always in a small hand in a small notebook that Buz didn’t know existed.

 _Bang_.

Abruptly the car was skewing across the empty road and Tod was fighting to keep it in a straight line, to keep it from slewing into the dusty grass that stretched out either side of the road.

‘Shit,’ he cursed as the wheel pulled against his hands. ‘Jesus. Shit, shit.’

Buz knocked his hat down into the footwell and sat up straight in his seat, bracing a hand on the dash and blinking blearily into the sunshine as Tod wrestled the car back on course and slowed it to a halt.

‘You should tell me when you’re going to do things like that, Tod, and I’ll put my seatbelt on,’ he commented. He had been too much asleep to feel the same immediate shock that Tod had.

‘ _I_ should tell you? Someone should tell _me_ ,’ Tod spluttered. ‘Damn. Must have had a blow out.’

Buz looked out over the edge of the car at the front tyre. It was no longer a tyre, but a shredded mess of rubber on a battered rim.

‘Yeah, that’s a blow out. I’ll go get the spare.’

Tod sighed, rubbing the sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand.

‘Buz,’ he said gently, in the way he might speak to a child. ‘Do you remember when you got that flat back in town when you drove straight over a broken bottle because you were too busy looking at the chick you had in the seat next to you? Remember how you promised to take the tyre and fix it before we left it?’

‘Oh – yeah,’ Buz said, picking up his hat and slipping it on again so that it conveniently shaded his eyes. ‘Yeah, I remember that.’

‘And did you take it and get it fixed?’ Tod asked him.

‘Well…’ Buz scratched the back of his head. ‘Barbara wanted to go to the movies, and – ’

‘You didn’t fix it.’

‘I’m sorry, buddy.’ He tipped his hat up again and twisted to look at the road stretching out behind them. ‘How far are we from town?’

‘By now? About thirty miles. Do _you_ fancy walking it?’

‘A car’ll come along before long, I’m sure,’ Buz said.

‘I sure hope so,’ Tod said grimly. ‘Tell me, Buz, was Barbara really worth it?’

‘Well…’ Buz glanced at Tod with a sheepish grin. ‘I guess you could say that. What, Tod. Are you pissed because I didn’t share her?’

‘I’m pissed because you didn’t get the damn tyre fixed,’ Tod said, anger suddenly rising in his voice. ‘One thing, Buz. You had to do _one thing._ What is it with you? You want to drift from one side of the country to the other and never have a moment of responsibility to stick in your craw? You want to be the poet without writing anything down, the musician who can’t play, the guy who ends up panhandling on Fifth Avenue because all his dreams ran away while he was sleeping? Is that what you want?’

He didn’t wait to hear Buz’s response. He jerked himself out of the car and stalked off into the grasses, his fists clenched at his sides. The adrenaline from what had almost been a crash was still pumping through his system and he felt like hitting something, and angry as he was he didn’t want it to be Buz.

Damn.

The whole of Kansas, and they had to get stuck in the only place that didn’t have a sea-sized cornfield and a farmer to tend it. He tilted back his head and looked up at the sky. Not a cloud. Not even the trail from a jetliner making its way across the empty continent.

Behind him he heard the car door slam, and knew that Buz was stalking away for his own moment of anger. Like a child, Tod sat down in the grass, knowing it would hide him from view. A moment later he lay back and put his arms behind his head, trying to steady his breathing and control his anger. This wasn’t the first time Buz had done something like that – but it wasn’t as if he, Tod, was immune from dropping responsibility and flying on the wings of fate. Both as bad as each other, maybe. Maybe that’s why they made a good pair. Besides, that tyre repair place in the town back there hadn’t looked any too good. They wouldn’t have known a Corvette if it was driven right onto the forecourt with a neon light on top.

He lay still and let the sun beat down onto his face. It was almost entirely silent in this place. No cars, no airplanes, no beat of industry or of music playing, no clatter of voices. There was only the noise of grasshoppers and birds and the wind gently moving in the dry grass stalks. The rest of the world could have ceased to exist.

And then the sound of footsteps, cautious through the grass, and Buz’s voice, quiet and enquiring.

‘So what are you saying, Tod? We should settle down somewhere? Get a nine to five and a nice house with a mortgage attached?’

Buz didn’t sound defensive. Just curious and chastened.

Tod opened his eyes and was immediately dazzled by the sun. Buz was nothing more than a silhouette against a sky that looked white. He pulled his arms out from under his head and tried to work the stiffness out of his shoulders.

‘No, I’m not saying that,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry, Buz. I guess I was just mad at you. I thought for a moment there I was going to kill us both.’

The silhouette descended and Buz lay down beside him in the grass, just close enough so that his arm was touching Tod’s arm. ‘Well, I’m sorry I didn’t get that tyre fixed,’ he said finally

‘There’s nothing to be done about it now,’ Tod said resignedly, bumping his shoulder against Buz’s and feeling a slight movement in response. Enough of the apologies. There was no point in wallowing.

They lay in silence for a long while with the sun pushing into their bones and the scent of warm dirt and hay rising around them.

‘You know, it wouldn’t work,’ Buz said finally.

Tod jumped. He hadn’t realised that he was falling asleep.

‘What wouldn’t work?’ he murmured without opening his eyes.

‘The house, the mortgage, the nine to five. How long would it take before people started asking questions? I mean, two guys bumping around in a sports car – no one asks questions about that. But two guys living in a house together – not a bachelor pad, but a real house, double bed in the bedroom and a picket fence and a gas stove in the kitchen. How long before we’re kicked out of town for being perverts, queers, abominations and all that shit?’

Tod grunted. ‘We both manage to bring enough girls home, Buz. We both enjoy that side of it. I don’t see why anyone would start thinking anything.’

Buz turned his head sideways. ‘When did you ever do anything like this when you were staying in one place?’ he asked. ‘When did you ever do anything like this before you met _me_? Ever been in one of those bars and had the vice cops sweep in? Ever been minding your own business in your own place with some guy and walked out the door the next morning to find dog shit dumped on your doorstep because you had the curtains a crack – just a crack, mind – open and someone was looking in? You asked me when we worked for your dad why I moved place so often. Well, that was why.’

Tod turned his head to look at him, looking into the depths of Buz’s eyes and trying to read some of the memories that were folded inside his mind. Hearing about them was one thing, but some perverse part of him wanted to actually imagine what that might have been like.

‘Don’t look at me like that,’ Buz said. ‘I’m not a crushed human soul. I don’t lie awake at night thinking about it. I just moved on – and so do you now.’

‘They do ask questions,’ Tod said after a long silence.

‘Huh?’ Buz asked.

‘Two guys bumping around in a sports car. They ask questions. _How did you guys hook up together? How long you been travelling round for? Why don’t you get a nice girl and settle down?_ ’

‘Yeah, well, we don’t stay long enough for them to get too curious,’ Buz shrugged. ‘That’s fine. They can think what they like after we’re gone.’

‘Let’s just stay here,’ Tod said with a grin, rolling onto his side.

‘Here?’

‘Yeah, here, in the grass. We can live like corn snakes, nothing but the sky as our roof and the dirt as our bed.’

‘I like flushable toilets,’ Buz commented.

Tod reached out a hand and traced his finger along Buz’s cheekbone. ‘So do I,’ he admitted. ‘And fresh sheets on a firm bed. And a burger place just round the corner.’

But Buz looked _good_ lying on that warm grass, the yellows and browns echoing on his tanned skin, his hair falling back and mingling with the grass stalks. A surge of need began to rise in him.

‘Anyway, with that hair and those freckles you blend right in with the grass,’ Buz said. ‘Someone would mow you down.’

‘You know, suddenly I want that firm bed and the closable curtains and a burger place just round the corner,’ Tod said with a grin.

‘We’re thirty miles from the nearest human habitation,’ Buz said realistically. ‘If you want that you’re not getting to do it on a bed. Anyway, what’s wrong with hay? What’s wrong with staying out here all night with the sleeping bags and walking out for help in the morning? We’ve got food and water and everything else we need. Why not stay here for the night, for free?’

Tod put his arms behind his head again, staring up into the sky, knowing that the colour above him would be catching in his eyes in a way that the dark-eyed Buz couldn’t resist.

‘Out here, in the open, not twenty feet from the road?’ he pretended to demure. ‘You’re crazy. But I’m at least going to take the opportunity to get some sun while we’re shipwrecked on this desert island.’

And he began to loosen his tie and slip the buttons of his shirt from their tight holes. He stretched in the sun, pulling his arms out of his short sleeves, and Buz’s eyes widened at the sight of his tanned and freckled chest bared to the sun.

‘Well, if you’re going to taunt me with that, Mr Stiles, I might find myself compelled to take advantage of you,’ he said in a low voice.

He didn’t wait for a response. Instead, he put his hand to the button on Tod’s pants and pulled it open with one deft movement. Tod grinned, perfectly happy to keep his hands behind his head and let Buz do all the work.

 

******

 

Tod woke in the morning with the sun already hot and strong on the back of his neck, with his arms and legs and naked body tangled around Buz in the zipped-together sleeping bags. The world was still silent but for birds and grasshoppers and the sound of Buz’s breath pushing out between his lips. He felt like warm toffee. He could have lain like that for a thousand years. His arm was looped over Buz’s chest, his fingers half-numb under the pressure of his back. He could smell the scent of sweat rising from Buz’s warm body every time he took a breath.

‘That’s one for the memoirs,’ he murmured, and Buz stirred.

‘Hmm? What? Last night?’

‘That, and that I woke up before you,’ Tod laughed quietly.

Buz stretched and found that his movement was stifled by Tod’s heavy limbs.

‘It’s the country air,’ he said, budging Tod off him and stretching luxuriously.

‘You were pretty busy last night,’ Tod reminded him.

‘You and me both. You ready for that thirty mile walk back to town?’

‘I’m never going to move,’ Tod said.

‘We have to move,’ Buz told him, sitting up. That was the best and the worst of Buz. He could never lie still in one place for long. ‘Have to get back to reality. That nine to five job. The bed with the fresh sheets and the hamburger joint round the corner. New challenges. A little more cash in the bank in Denver.’

‘A little closer to the mortgage and the picket fence, huh?’ Tod laughed.

‘Well, maybe a week off and a stay in a Hilton, anyway,’ Buz rejoined.

He slipped out of the cocoon of sleeping bags and stood up in the slanting sunlight, perfectly naked and completely unselfconscious. Tod grinned lazily at the sight. Even the shadow that was thrown across the sleeping bags was pleasing to look at.

‘You know, I think there’s a car coming,’ Buz said from his vantage point, shading his eyes with his head. ‘It’s a long way off, but I can see the dust it’s raising.’

‘You gonna put some clothes on, or try to entice him to stop with your natural assets?’ Tod asked, looking around for his own clothes which were none too carefully strewn about the grass by their impromptu bed.

Buz shrugged, and Tod knew that he was just as likely to stride out into the road just as he had been born as he was to don respectable clothing first. He just didn’t care about things like that.

‘I’ll go,’ Tod said, hastily pulling on his own clothes. ‘I don’t want you to ruin our chances.’

‘It might be a lady,’ Buz shrugged.

‘In that case she might accelerate into the distance twice as fast. But you know, Buz, I’m not sure you want to be rescued.’

The car was coming closer, and he could see now that it was a station wagon, brown and dusty and coming at a good speed. The Corvette was just off the edge of the road, perfectly visible, but not in danger of being hit, at least. Two bust tyres were enough woes for now. Tod jogged toward the road as it approached, holding up his hand to flag it down.

The car began a low, long hoot of its horn that wavered as the vehicle approached, sped by, and began to be swallowed up again by its own cloud of dust. Tod flung his arms up in disgust and turned back to the virgin grasses where Buz was waiting.

‘Tough luck the first guy who drives by is an idiot,’ he said to Buz as he reached him. He looked back down at the rumpled sleeping bags. Buz was sitting on them, still naked as a jay bird and golden in the morning sun. ‘Fancy a little exercise before breakfast?’ he asked.

 


End file.
